


Sinners Burn

by thesunisloud



Category: Preacher (TV)
Genre: Ass-Kicking, Cassidy whump, Dark, Episode: s01e07 He Gone, F/M, Jesse being an asshole, Tulip kicking ass, Tulip literally looking for blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2016-07-14
Packaged: 2018-07-24 01:34:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7488216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesunisloud/pseuds/thesunisloud
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The immediate aftermath of Cassidy burning in S01E07 He Gone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sinners Burn

"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!"

Jesse was hosing Cassidy down now, but not before standing there for far too long...

... Almost not doing it.

Almost letting him burn.

Almost condemning two sinners to the inferno today.

Almost listening to the voice that said, "Leave it be. This is right."

But then his hands had leapt to the extinguisher and Cassidy's thrashing body was covered in foam and Jesse was swearing, constantly, thoughtlessly, uncreatively, yelping out,

"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!"

Finally, Cassidy was covered. He wasn't burning or moving any more. Jesse gathered up his leg and pulled him into the shade.

He stopped swearing, and now he could hear Cassidy sobbing. Gasps and the occasional whimpered, "shite."

Jesse used Cassidy's hoodie to wipe most of the foam off of him. He was... totally wrecked.

His entire face, arms, and torso were black and blistered. Muscle had begun to get eaten away. A human would be dead. But Cassidy was still alive, groaning and swearing.

"Come on, let's get you inside," Jesse said, hauling him up. Cassidy let out a gurgle of pain at the touch.

Jesse wrestled him to his makeshift home and laid him on the mattress. Cassidy writhed in discomfort, still sobbing and letting out the occasional cuss.

Jesse stood and watched him for a long time.

"I need-- I need blood. To heal," Cassidy forced out.

"A vampire, eh?" he asked.

Maybe Cassidy nodded. It was hard to tell.

"A sinner." And Jesse got real quiet and thoughtful. He watched Cassidy writhe and cry for a long time more, then left.

He went downstairs, and finished eating his meal.

***

He supposed he should go get some blood.

Jesse was already out and walking. He had been walking for quite some time, feeling lost in thought but not actually thinking anything.

Did it need to be living blood? From a chicken or something? Or could he just buy a couple pints of pig blood from the butcher? It didn't have to be human blood from a living human victim, did it?

He paced and thought and avoided thinking, and eventually he found himself at the Loaches'.

"'Bout time for a house call," he found himself muttering. He knocked on the door. "Mrs. Loach!"

Mrs. Loach opened the door, all smiles and sunshine. "Preacher," she said happily. "Are you here to pray with my daughter?"

"Yes I am," Jesse said.

He sat with the beautiful girl for quite a while. Sitting and staring, that had become the bulk of his day, hadn't it. He rested with his face in his hands.

Her eyes were open now and her mother had placed in front of her a medium-sized TV. It was tuned to a dog show. On the screen, a schnauzer jumped over ramps and hoops, nose obediently pointed to its master's hand.

"Can you do anything I tell you, Tracy?" Jesse asked. "Can you do the impossible? Can you come back to life?" He bowed his head and wrung his hands. "Can you... undo this sin?"

Jesse slapped his leg. "FUCK," he said. He left without another word, even as Mrs. Loach walked alongside him, inviting him to dinner sometime, and can that nice Eugene come over as well?

***

"Cassidy? You up here?"

Tulip crept up the church stairs, feeling a real bad twisting in her gut. "Cassidy? Did Jesse do somethin' to you?"

She walked into his room. "The FUCK."

Something black and twisted moaned. "I don't want ye to see me when I'm not lookin' pretty..."

"CASSIDY?" she asked. She fell to her knees next to him.

"Hey there, love," Cassidy said. She couldn't even recognize his face-- could barely recognize his voice through the hoarseness and strain. "Could I bother ye to get me some Jack Daniels... and some blood?"

"What the FUCK did that crotchmuncher to do you??"

"He, ah," Cassidy said, shifting and hissing. "It was more, more of a team effort, y'know?"

Tulip stood abruptly and punched the wall. Her fist went clean through the particle board. She yelled and punched it some more.

"Look, lass," Cassidy slurred. "Don't go on a rampage fer my sake. Or do-- I'm gettin' a bit sore at him fer takin' so long to get back to me. I just need--"

"What, is he comin' back to finish the job??"

"Look, he-- he's out gettin' me some blood. Or he was. Somethin' more important came up, I suppose." Cassidy let out a dry chuckle. "Could ye be a dear--?"

"Oh, I'll get you blood all right," Tulip growled. She slammed the door to Cassidy's room behind her and shouted, "I'll get you all the blood you need!"

***

Jesse had to fix things. Right?

Get blood, heal Cass. Go to hell, retrieve Eugene. Dig up the grave, revive Ted.

No, no, no. Things didn't need to be fixed. They deserved this. They deserved what they got. Cassidy, throwing himself out in the sun like that to prove a goddamned point. Eugene, killing that girl. Ted, being such a mother-pecked wuss. Everyone, everyone in this goddamned town, sinners, deserving to burn, and by God, he was the one chosen to do it.

... After all, some things couldn't be fixed...

No. He'd done right. Nothing needed to be fixed. If anything, Cassidy had to be dragged back out into the sun. Finish the job.

Finish the job.

He'd finished the job for Eugene. Now, the rest of the town was next. That pedophile bus driver? Go to hell. That pissant Donnie? Go to hell. That apathetic sheriff? Go to hell. Tulip? Go to hell, go to hell, go to hell, all of you go to hell.

He'll hold a congregation next Sunday, and over the loudspeaker, he'll tell the whole town, "Go to hell."

He'd done right. There was no mistake. He was acting on the will of God. Nothing needed to be fixed. He was right, he was right, he was right...

***

Nurses and EMTs flurried in Tulip's peripheral vision as she stalked into the hospital.

"Excuse me, miss--" a dozen times fluttered impotently against her ears. She grabbed a nurse by her perfect little scrubs and said, "Tell me where the blood is." Met with nothing but stammers, she threw her away and found it her goddamned self.

With an arm full of blood packs, storming towards the door, patients and staff staring at her with slack mouths, she shouted, "Does any of you cocksuckers know where the fuck the goddamned Preacher is?"

***

Jesse was at the bar.

Just one more shot of bourbon. One last glass at the end of that long line. One more shot, and he'd... he'd... he didn't know what he'd do.

***

"Okay, Cass. I got you some blood and Jack."

"Sweetest words a woman ever said to me," Cassidy grinned. She dumped her armful of blood on the bed next to him. She helped him sit up and he grabbed the whiskey out of her hand and took a long swig. He drained half the bottle before going for the blood.

"Once you're good, I am going right back out and I am finding that goddamned piss tube and I am going to beat his ass straight to hell."

"Hmm. Funny you should mention that," Cassidy mumbled as he tore open the blood packet with his teeth. He drained the blood, then went for another, and another. His skin began to reappear, surfacing like a pod of whales from beneath the black char.

"That is amazing," Tulip said, trailing her fingers over the islands of fresh skin.

"Yeah. I'll have to start fresh with my tattoos again. Some of 'em I'll have done over just the same. Others... I think it's time to try somethin' new. Maybe one of some new, popular actor. Like Joe Gilgun." He took a few more swigs of Jack and ripped open another blood pack.

Tulip ran her hand thoughtfully up and down his arm. Skin seemed to anticipate her movement and welled up to lay a path for her touch.

"You know," she said, "I could sure use some gratitude for savin' you."

"Fer the second time, even." Cassidy dropped his empty blood pack and lifted his arms. He and Tulip checked over his body for raw spots. Everything looked good. The tattoos were indeed gone, along with his scars; he was pristine.

"Fuck me," Tulip said.

"Now, I don't think that idea's the best. He's me best friend, and yer his girlfriend..."

Tulip grabbed Cassidy's arm and looked him dead in the eyes. "Ain't my boyfriend no more."

Without breaking eye contact, Cassidy took a long swig of whiskey.

"We did it once," Tulip said. "Don't change nothin' to do it again."

"Ye really are somethin' when yer all fired up like this."

"Believe me, I will show you fire."

Tulip jumped on the bed and straddled his lap. "I'll show you goddamned explosions." She rubbed right up against him, and how could he help getting hard? She dragged her nails down his back, marking the virgin skin with long, pink lines.

Cassidy took another drink and put the bottle aside. He leaned in to smell her neck. "Ye say he ain't yer boyfriend no more?"

"Fuck it, Cassidy, we haven't been together since before I came to town. He don't want me back. Even after I begged him."

"All right," Cassidy said, sliding his hands under her shirt. "So what is this then? Gratitude, yeah?"

"Yeah."

He said, "thank ye," and kissed her good and deep.

***

"Mommy! Mommy, look at this. Look at this!" the little brat whined.

"Yes, it's great," Emily said, glancing at her kid's drawing. She put her eyes right back on the screen. Next week's pamphlet was a mess. The words just didn't cooperate in making nice, even columns. She put in extra spaces and tried to come up with shorter synonyms for the long words that wanted to spread themselves across half a column. She was trying to come up with an alternative to "reprehensible" when the phone rang.

She muttered darkly to herself, stepping over kids and toys to get from her computer to the ringing phone. "Hello?"

"Emily."

"Preacher."

"What are you doing?"

"I'm putting together your church programs," Emily said. "The content is real hard to justify."

There was silence on the other end, then a click.

Emily sighed. "Hello? Hello?"

***

"You know what you should get here," Tulip said, laying in bed behind Cassidy and tracing his shoulder blade.

"Hmm?"

"Tulip."

Cassidy rolled over to face her. "So did we make love this time, or was it just fuckin'?"

"First time was fuckin'. Next two times was makin' love. Then we fucked again. And then, this last time?" Tulip smiled. "You're cute when you're all worn out. That was makin' love."

"Cassidy?" Jesse pushed sheepishly through the door, wrestling two live chickens. "I wasn't sure what kind of--"

"YOU SON OF A BITCH!" Tulip screamed. She launched herself out of bed and pummeled him like a tornado full of rocks.

"AaAAaAAaaa..." Jesse said, dropping the sqwaking chickens and putting up his hands in ill-prepared defense. Tulip got him right in the jaw with a good roundhouse punch and knocked him to the floor, then proceeded to stomp on him.

"YOU GODDAMNED PISS-CHUGGING BABY-FUCKING SHITHOLE!"

Jesse knocked her leg out from under her and tried to tackle her. "Tulip, listen--" he started, then was cut off by a knee to his solar plexus.

"YOU JIZZ-SOAKED TWATWAFFLE!" She bit and punched him. He got his feet and landed a couple good punches on her, but then she threw him to the floor again and stood over him, landing heavy blows from above. "YOU BURNED HIM??? YOU FUCKING BURNED HIM??? He is your goddamned BEST FRIEND, Jesse! AND YOU LIT HIM ON FUCKING FIRE??!!!"

"Tulip, hey," Cassidy said, a little dazed at the sight of her fighting in the full-on buff. "Padre. Jesse! Tulip! EY!!"

"YOU LEFT HIM LIKE THIS ALL DAMN DAY, YOU FUCKING CUM CAKE! YOU BURNED HIM! YOU--"

"Tulip, Tulip, stop," Cassidy said, pulling on pants. "Leave 'im alone."

"FOR WHAT HE DID TO YOU?!! I'M GONNA BEAT THE GODDAMN TAR OUTTA EVERY HOLE IN HIS BODY!" She hauled Jesse up against the wall and strangled him. "FUCKING SHITBAG!"

Cassidy put his hand on her shoulder. "Ye don't understand, lass. Jesse didn't burn me."

Tulip stared at Cassidy with gritted teeth, her fist still tight around Jesse's throat.

"He saved me."

***

The three of them sat on the steps to the church, watching the sun go down. Two chickens pecked the ground at their feet. Cassidy held a bottle of Jack. Tulip held a bottle of vodka. Jesse held a bag of frozen peas against his face.

In the free hand of all three of them was a cigarette.

"Did we learn somethin' today?" Cassidy asked. "It seems like we should'a learned somethin'."

"I learned what a good fuck you are and what a goddamned FUCK Jesse is," Tulip said.

Jesse was silent.

"I learned how refreshin' it is to get a new set of skin," Cassidy said jovially. "It's nice to not look like a men's room wall. How 'bout you, padre?"

Jesse was silent.

"So is that really true, Jesse?" Tulip asked. "Did you save him?"

Jesse stood. He lowered the bag of peas and stared at the two of them a good, long time.

 **"Forget everything that happened today,"** he said in his Heavenly voice, and went back inside the church.

**Author's Note:**

> Suggestions make us better! Please leave your comments below.


End file.
